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Thursday, 2 January 2014

Flying Robot That Was Inspired By Jellyfish

The movement of jellyfish is unique, and it moves in a rhythm. Now, there is a robot created by a team of scientists is able to move in the same way that those mysterious animals. This robot is the exact replica of the jelly fish that travels through the air in the same way that of its animal model.
This incredible robot is the brainchild of researchers at New York University.

What is peculiar in that is, it can float in the air with an inspired functioning of jellyfish. Indeed, the drone reproduces the movement of aquatic animal pulse to stabilize in the air and move on. Many drones are already inspired by insects to fly or to avoid obstacles but the same principle of insect wings is something difficult to replicate by robots of this size.

This is why researchers at the university have developed a prototype inspired by jellyfish. The robot consists of four "wings" shaped petals that allow it to remain stable in the air at any time, but also to advance in spurts.
This little robot measures only 8 inches tall and weighs just only 2 grams, limited just by the size and weight required to operate its wings energy.

This robot can thus float as a jellyfish and remain in suspension or fly in any direction but it cannot be directed towards a specific direction for the moment. Its inventor, Leif Ristroph says that for now “it is only a proof of concept" and we are still far from having a robot like this really usable.
The researchers now facing a challenge is to reducing the robot size of a centimeter so that it can be used in surveillance missions and go completely unnoticed in some areas.

The concept of this robot is really interesting. It's crazy to watch him move through the air like a real jellyfish. We would like to see more robots inspired from the animal kingdom as is the case here. For now, its uses are still limited but we hope that they exceed the scope of supervision to be helpful to us too.